Back in 2006, the date of the cited article, and for many years prior to that, I used to interact routinely with the leadership of Marsh. They are indeed, hard nosed businessmen constantly looking for new opportunities. It's absolutely true, they certainly were "not making money denying warming"..........they were too smart for that. This is where they have been making money from warming.......

"Increasing awareness of environmental sustainability issues and government regulation has made the "green" space an important area of interest and concern for clients. The businesses of Marsh & McLennan Companies have developed a range of services and provide consulting advice related to environmental sustainability issues."
http://www.mmc.com/sustainability/clients.php

Both Mike Fick and mrgybe have cherrypicked data about sea-ice in the Antarctic, picking up on denier claims that increased sea-ice in that region offsets the nearly complete disappearance of sea ice in the arctic. The Fickster makes a claim that completely misunderstands the difference in the climate between the two regions, and the deniers conveniently ignore the data that shows substantial warming on the land. Here from NASA:

Quote:

Satellites Confirm Half-Century of West Antarctic Warming01.21.09 > Print resolution image
Red represents areas where temperatures have increased the most during the last 50 years, particularly in West Antarctica, while dark blue represents areas with a lesser degree of warming. Temperature changes are measured in degrees Celsius. Credit: NASA/GSFC Scientific Visualization Studio The Antarctic Peninsula juts into the Southern Ocean, reaching farther north than any other part of the continent. The southernmost reach of global warming was believed to be limited to this narrow strip of land, while the rest of the continent was presumed to be cooling or stable.

Not so, according to a new analysis involving NASA data. In fact, the study has confirmed a trend suspected by some climate scientists.

"Everyone knows it has been warming on the Antarctic Peninsula, where there are lots of weather stations collecting data," said Eric Steig, a climate researcher at the University of Washington in Seattle, and lead author of the study. "Our analysis told us that it is also warming in West Antarctica."

The finding is the result of a novel combination of historical temperature data from ground-based weather stations and more recent data from satellites. Steig and colleagues used data from each record to fill in gaps in the other and to reconstruct a 50-year history of surface temperatures across Antarctica.

Over the years, climate research in northern latitudes led researchers to believe that the Arctic is where impacts of global climate change would be seen first. Less certain is how climate is affecting Antarctica where inland temperatures are known to plunge to minus 112°F, and ground-based weather stations have been sparse.

It's this sparse data collection—from ground-stations on the Antarctic Peninsula and previous reports that much of East Antarctica has experienced cooling since 1978—that led the International Panel on Climate Change to conclude in its most recent report that Antarctica is the one continent where we have failed to detect human-caused temperature changes.

With funding from the National Science Foundation's Office of Polar Programs, Steig and colleagues set out to reconstruct Antarctica’s recent past. Ground-based stations have recorded temperatures since 1957, but most of those readings come from the peninsula and areas on the edges of the continent. But at the same time, scientists such as study co-author Joey Comiso of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., have been gathering measurements from a series of Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) instruments deployed on satellites since 1981.

> Larger image
The northern section of the Larsen B ice shelf, a large floating ice mass on the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula, shattered and separated from the continent on March 5, 2002, and represents a major impact that climate warming can have on the region. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory To construct the new 50-year temperature record, the team applied a statistical technique to estimate temperatures missing from ground-based observations. They calculated the relationship between overlapping satellite and ground-station measurements over the past 26 years. Next, they applied that correlation to ground measurements from 1957 to 1981 and calculated what the satellites would have observed.

The new analysis shows that Antarctic surface temperatures increased an average of 0.22°F (0.12°C) per decade between 1957 and 2006. That's a rise of more than 1°F (0.5°C) in the last half century. West Antarctica warmed at a higher rate, rising 0.31°F (0.17°C) per decade. The results, published Jan. 22 in Nature, confirm earlier findings based on limited weather station data and ice cores.

While some areas of East Antarctica have been cooling in recent decades, the longer 50-year trend depicts that, on average, temperatures are rising across the continent.

West Antarctica is particularly vulnerable to climate changes because its ice sheet is grounded below sea level and surrounded by floating ice shelves. If the West Antarctic ice sheet completely melted, global sea level would rise by 16 to 20 feet (5 to 6 meters).

To identify causes of the warming, the team turned to Drew Shindell of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, who has used computer models to identify mechanisms driving Antarctica's enigmatic temperature trends.

Previously, researchers focused on Antarctic ozone depletion, which influences large-scale atmospheric fluctuations around the continent—most notably, the Southern Annular Mode, which speeds up wind flow to isolate and cool the continent.

Shindell compared Steig's temperature data with results from a computer model that can simulate the response of the atmospheric system to changes in land surface, ice cover, sea surface temperatures, and atmospheric composition. He found the ozone-influenced Southern Annular Mode is not necessarily the primary influence on Antarctic climate. Instead, it appears that smaller-scale, regional changes in wind circulation are bringing warmer air and more moisture-laden storms to West Antarctica.

"We still believe ozone depletion can increase wind speeds around Antarctica, further isolating the interior," Shindell said. "But it's clear now that it's not such a dominant influence on temperature trends."

So to summarize, satellite data shows a temperature increase on land of 1 degree Fahrenheit in the last fifty years--about twice the rate of the overall average. So why, ask our deniers, hasn't the ice in the antarctic melted with this increase? Well, the average summer temperature there is 20 degrees Fahrenheit--so any impacts of warming are buffered, and hopefully prevented, by starting with a colder average temperature. But remember that there is a large volume of ice on land, and unlike the melting of sea-ice, any significant melting of antarctic land ice will have a big impact on sea level.
http://library.thinkquest.org/CR0215022/climate.htm
The summer average for the arctic is much warmer--29 degrees F. http://www.athropolis.com/arctic-facts/fact-arctic-cold.htm Does this have an impact on sea-ice? You think? Oh, that's right, you didn't.

For a scientist's view of the issue, you might try "Lost Antarctica: Adventures in a Disappearing Land" by James McClintock. Just a hint--he doesn't think that climate change is a myth. But I'm pretty sure that carbon industries integrity is a myth.

Nothing wrong with that, obviously. ANY crisis has two faces, financial ruin and financial gain. By investing in or selling the right product, a person or corporation can make a ton of money off any short or long term catastrophe. Just as many got filthy rich, legally, off the Great Depression, many can and do still get rich off today's threats to the public at large, including AGW, global economic collapse, Obamacare, wealth redistribution, jihad, etc. Look at the scores of millions Gore made by hyping AGW, the vast fortunes made by Weiss on the Great Depression, the Kennedys on prohibition, etc. Leave no crisis unmilked!

Marsh & McLennan sells insurance, which if well managed is almost guaranteed to make money because it's a "cost plus" concept: whatever their expenses may be, insurers can raise premiums to ensure a profit in the long term. If the government restricts premiums to some unprofitable level or customers balk, they can stop insuring that loss and find or invent another risk they can insure without restriction. Simplistically, the primary limits to an insurer's profit margin are competition and overregulation, both of which can be end-run by smart companies.

Marsh & McLennan sells insurance, which if well managed is almost guaranteed to make money because it's a "cost plus" concept: whatever their expenses may be, insurers can raise premiums to ensure a profit in the long term. If the government restricts premiums to some unprofitable level or customers balk, they can stop insuring that loss and find or invent another risk they can insure without restriction. Simplistically, the primary limits to an insurer's profit margin are competition and overregulation, both of which can be end-run by smart companies.

What a country!

Crock of foul water. Insurance companies are required to have enough cash on hand to pay all claims. Since even the best bean counters and actuarial reports get claim forecasts wrong from time to time, the reinsurers come around to bail out the insurers. The remainder of the insurer's liquidity is split between operations and the equity and debt markets.

One cannot simply stop paying legitimate claims, and one cannot easily transition from covering certain losses to not covering and loose the premiums.

"Inventing another risk" to insure is about as upside down an analysis as we've seen from you. Unless you charge outrageous premiums to insure exotic risks that one cannot reasonably anticipate being invented (like Lloyds) it's very, very difficult to expand lines of coverage without bumping into competitors already accounting for 100% of the market share. Grow the market, you say? That requires changing the demographics, usually, and can only be done rapidly by . . . wait for it . . . legislation! What's an anti-govmit person to do?_________________Support Your Sport. Join US Windsurfing!
www.USWindsurfing.org

1. Marsh & McLennan is not an insurance company. It is an insurance broker.

2. Insurers can indeed keep raising premiums, but, eventually customers will stop buying. However, if the government mandates premium growth limits, while expanding coverage, insurers will drop out of the market. That is a likely outcome of ACA.

3. Reinsurers do not "bail out the insurers". They pay claims on policies purchased from them by those insurers.

4. It is quite common for insurance companies to drop a line of business, or to significantly restrict the limits they will offer. That is often driven by disappearing reinsurance capacity.

Fundamentally, the insurance business is simple. Over time, an insurance company has to collect more in premiums and investment income, than it pays out in claims and administration. If the government mandates that companies take on risks which will almost certainly result in the non recovery of claims paid out (as is likely to happen when covering individuals with pre-existing conditions) any company will have to consider whether that is a business in which they should continue to participate. They are in business to make money, not to provide a philanthropic service.

1. Marsh & McLennan is not an insurance company. It is an insurance broker.

2. Insurers can indeed keep raising premiums, but, eventually customers will stop buying. However, if the government mandates premium growth limits, while expanding coverage, insurers will drop out of the market. That is a likely outcome of ACA.

3. Reinsurers do not "bail out the insurers". They pay claims on policies purchased from them by those insurers.

4. It is quite common for insurance companies to drop a line of business, or to significantly restrict the limits they will offer. That is often driven by disappearing reinsurance capacity.

Fundamentally, the insurance business is simple. Over time, an insurance company has to collect more in premiums and investment income, than it pays out in claims and administration. If the government mandates that companies take on risks which will almost certainly result in the non recovery of claims paid out (as is likely to happen when covering individuals with pre-existing conditions) any company will have to consider whether that is a business in which they should continue to participate. They are in business to make money, not to provide a philanthropic service.

1. We agree.

2. We agree.

3. We agree. I used flowery language to get the point across.

4. Yes, insurance companies do drop lines, but not happily, nor do they do it without a view that the ability to collect premiums will no longer support the quantified risk. Like I said, one of the only ways to change demographics quickly is through legislation. We agree._________________Support Your Sport. Join US Windsurfing!
www.USWindsurfing.org

leave it to an Obama hater to hijack a thread away from news that some insurance companies are beginning to worry about flooding and extreme weather coverage because claims are going up do to climate change--to an attack on the ACA.

Did you have trouble paying attention in school too? Transitions were hard?

They were stowaways on increasingly popular European cruise liners which carry mainly wealthy Germans on Antarctic sunbathing cruises. The rabbits carelessly got left behind, along with several deckchairs with... this seat reserved towels draped over them.

Has anybody studied the possible effect that undoubted global warming (when it eventually becomes impossible to ignore) will have on the minds of rabid deniers? Should they be issued with reflective tin foil hats to help them 'keep their cool'?

Has anybody studied the possible effect that undoubted global warming (when it eventually becomes impossible to ignore) will have on the minds of rabid deniers? Should they be issued with reflective tin foil hats to help them 'keep their cool'?

They are in business to make money, not to provide a philanthropic service.

HERESY! Many occutards and college students and some congressmen are on record as favoring prohibiting corporations from making a profit. This is the Omabanation now, where profit = greed and evil. He and Hillary have often said in formal statements that they favor taking profits from those who earned them and giving them to those who do not.

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